For the non-believers he was confirmed as being a real crytek employee by one of the admins/mods. ( And if you read through the above link you'll run into that confirmation )

I strongly suggest that if any of you have any questions about the game that haven't been answered, you head on over there, register and post your question(s).

So I asked him 4 questions that I was suprised weren't asked yet, my questions were...

1.) Will we see I.Q changes in FarCry? People at E3 were playing parts of the game with new textures such as the "rocks on the beach" scene. Will this be implemented in the new patch?

2.) For Ati user's, will 3Dc be enabled in this upcoming patch?

3.) Any possible expansion pack or sequel planned?

4.) If Ati fixed the 1.2 patch texture problems, what's taken so long and what have you been working on in this new patch?

His answers were

1.) I'm actually not sure about this but will find out if possible.

2.) Yes

3.) Currently, the only new content coming to the Far Cry Universe is Far Cry:Instincts, I suggest you check that out.

4.) We have been addressing bugs and working on 3DC.

While I didn't get a straight answer for #1, hopefully he will update us. I'd hate to think they are spending so much time with 3dc and none for us nvidia users. For those that arent aware, he also shot down rumors of the first guy who infested the board, claiming all the crytek employees had split up.

And secondly, he has already confirmed HDR will be in the next patch, but it will need to be enabled through the console.

Everyone asks about a release date, he can't confirm one and says the patch is currently undergoing extensive testing, but it will be out "soon".

So if VUG does decide to hold back HL2 for 6 months, at least we'll have some hdr effects to play with in FarCry And X800 users will finally get a taste of 3dc. (Which me thinks will speed up x800 cards even more on farcry and leave our gt's in the dust...but thats ok)

I will probably install the patch and play around with the HDR and any other new features for about 15 minutes and then put it back into "done" pile. Since I already completed the single player game once and the multiplayer portion is a bit lacking I probably won't play this again unless there is an expenasion pack and since EA hired Crytek I seriously doubt that will happen.

I first beat this game back at the start of the year on a ti4200/axp2400+ combo, on the medium difficulty setting, with frames around 15-40 fps. I hadn't really played it again since either, but in the last week or so i thought i'd give it a whirl on the new rig on the Realistic setting for a challenge.

Man, it's like a different game, and at Realistic level the AI is really sharp, maybe a little too sharp at times, hehe. And the graphics, just wow, all maxed out ingame settings at 1600x1200 with 2xAA and 8xAF, and i've never seen it drop below 30fps, it's usually closer to 60 if not above that. Far Cry is a brilliant game when the framerates are steady, the physics look incredible and so fluid, and everything reacts nicely.

Now that was enough to get me playing it again, it looked better than before, better than any other current DirectX game, and it felt different in the way the game reacted before, faster and smoother. And once i started playing, i realised this game has masses of replay value. On virtually every single level, if you scout around, you'll find at least 2 different routes, usually 3 or 4, to get to your objectives. Only when you get indoors does it become slightly linear, but even then, you can still find shortcuts and alternate ways to get somewhere. It's a really something special in any fps game to be able to replay levels and discover whole areas you've never seen, routes never taken. Kudos to the mappers at crytech, they put a huge amount of effort into every map to give you so many options. I'm up to level 11 of 20 now, on the realistic difficulty, which is bloody hard, and i'm still finding new routes on every level compared to my first run through back in march.

Also with such smooth fps the vehicles are really amazing. for example, in training after you hit the first camp and steal a buggy, i found out you can drive around the corner and steer off the road up a grass ramp the mappers put in and jump like 60 yards over the heads of those two mercs standing by their car below on the sand, run over the gimps standing on the beach further up, then turn around and take out the guy's you just flew over. Now that is seriously fun to do!

I know some first-person-shooter fans don't like this game, but it's like the uber-fps if you ask me. It's got dark indoors and bright outdoors, utterly beautiful graphics in both scenarios, a day-to-night-to-day dynamic light levels (complete with sunset and sunrise), lots of pretty cool weapons (rocket launcher, that shotgun, the sniper rifle, the mp5-sd silenced jobby, etc etc), an extremely open style of play, very well done and amusing physics, and even co-op play now!

Okay so the trigens suck later on, but it can be fun finding ways to efficiently despatch them even. And the story is utterly daft, but what does that matter really, like gordon freeman and black mesa have won any literary awards, hehe. I'd really urge anyone who hasn't already to give this game a go, the only real requirement to enjoy this game, imho, is to have some degree of affection for the original Predator movie. You are the predator, go play with those mercs!

Ok so i sound like a total fanboy i know, but really this game is underrated and often maligned when in my book it's as good as the original half-life and doom3 of late. It's all a question of how you approach the game, think of it as murderous orienteering - find a way from A to B, and kill the people in your path in clever ways.

I do like other games by the way, perhaps even more than far cry, Richard Burn's Rally is my number one game of late, another highly immersive, intelligent and rewarding title that suffers a lack of widespread acclaim.

And if you still hate far cry and find it plain boring, then i'll end by paraphrasing the grand inquisitor from a dostoyevsky novel; it is freedom that men fear more so than even slavery. And the essence of farcry's gameplay is just that, freedom.